


Like A Lion

by trojanrubies



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, Post - A Dance With Dragons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-09
Updated: 2013-09-09
Packaged: 2017-12-26 03:57:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/961300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trojanrubies/pseuds/trojanrubies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post canon one shot based on this line from Kent Follet's The Pillars of The Earth</p><p>"She wanted to say, I love you like a thunderstorm, like a lion, like a helpless rage; but instead she said: 'I think I'm going to marry Alfred.'"</p><p>[[[If you haven't read DWD this may be spoilery!]]]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like A Lion

**Author's Note:**

> This took me like an hour to write, self beta'd, one shot, all of that
> 
> Last line shamelessly stolen from ken Follet's the Pillars of the Earth, and so belongs to him, and the setting and the characters and all the rest belong to GRRM.
> 
> In summary I own nothing.

The Quiet Isle may be quiet, Brienne thought, but it certainly wasn’t warm. She Jaime, Hyle and Pod had finally reached their destination as the first snow began to fall. Now, hours later, it was several inches deep and showed no sign of stopping. They had been housed in one of the guest rooms on the edge of the isle. Ser Jaime Podrick and Hyle had all been placed on the same floor but she was alone on the floor above in a testament to the brother’s piety. In truth it was nice to be alone for a time, the past few weeks had been a trial for them all in terms of polite civility in tired company.

Long after the water in the bath the brothers had drawn for her had gone cold, she stepped out of the tub and pulled on a clean jerkin and overlarge hose. She could only be glad the brothers had no dress to give her. There was a small fire in the corner of the room but it was doing little against the power of the snows that continued to dash against the window. She shivered for a moment then pulled the blanket off the pallet, wrapped it around herself and sat on the hearth staring into the flames.

The time to think was just as welcome as the time to be alone. Not since she had left to look for Sansa had she truly had a moment to be alone with her thoughts. And by the seven she needed it now. Once they had fled from Lady Stoneheart Hyle Hunt had become the perfect gentleman. Kind, considerate and truly grateful to her for saving her life. They were well on the way to becoming true friends; they had sparred in the evening when Jaime taught young Pod and had shared food over a camp fire and helped one another survive. In truth there was only one other she was so close to in the entire world. Somewhere on the road Hyle had become a real comfort, a real friend. And now when he asked her to marry him there was a part of her that longed to say yes. The part that knew he would be a good companion and never ask her to be a home maker, never asked her to be subservient as she should be. He would ask her only to be her. Moreover he would take her home. To Tarth to her father and with news of the invasion reaching them even here she could do nothing but fear for him, for her home.

Yet, it wasn’t love, and he knew that as well as she. When they sparred together she would always glance away, she would never go too far. There was too much restraint. It was never that way with Jaime, even though he was still practicing with his left hand, would never be as good as he had been, with him she fought to the end, until they were wrestling on the floor, swords forgotten, tickling and laughing and crying with joy. At night when she dreamed, it was of him and when she woke in the morning it was him she would look for. It was his name she had whispered in her sleep and it was him she longed for.

She knew now that what she had felt for Renly was a child’s love, a child’s fancy. True love, as between the Mother and the Father, the Maid and the Warrior, that was what she felt for Jaime, the poor broken man who had saved her life more times than she could count, the man who had laughed at her and laughed with her and given her the sword. Every night Oath Keeper lay between them like a promise, something to be kept and held and cherished. Lying awake, as he stood guard, she would think of Ser Galladon, like she had when she was a child, she made up stories of him and the Maid and their magic sword. Except now Ser Galladon wore Jaime’s face, and the sword held streaks of red.

A gentle knock at the door woke her from her reprieve and Jaime stepped through without waiting for a response, as was the norm, for him.

“Ser Jaime,” she said as she tried to untangle herself from the blanket.

“Stay there wench,” he replied joining her on the dusty floor, “I won’t be long, snuck up to see you while the brothers are at prayer. Pod and you’re Hyle are fast asleep.”

“He’s not-“

“Quiet wench I’m just teasing. He’s quite smitten with you you know.” There was something in his eyes, something like regret but she couldn’t place it, and then he looked away and it was gone.

“Hyle?” she let out in a gasp, she knew of course that there was something genuine in Hyle’s proposals, but she hadn’t known that Jaime had seen it too. “He wants me to marry him,” she said after a moment and the fire crackled in reply.

“Brienne,” he started, and then swallowed his words, “I didn’t tell you before but the Queen, Cersei I mean,” he stopped again, “the rumours are true.”

“but-“

“I know. I said they weren’t. But they are. She asked me to come. She asked me to help.” He looked up and met her gaze his green eyes warm in the firelight. “I stayed with you instead.”

Her gut clenched and her skin felt as though the snow were falling on it, from the inside out. And then she leaned forward, placed her hands on either side of her lion’s face and kissed him.

*

Losing her maiden-head on an island that belonged to the seven, she thought later, was really not something she had ever seen herself doing. Yet it had been perfect, and all she had ever wanted, and it had been Jaime. She couldn’t stop smiling as they lay naked beneath the bed clothes with their left hands intertwined and her fingers ghosting along his arm. She was so warm her skin flushed pink and his body like a furnace. Yet she could feel the cold seeping through the walls into the room as the fire slowly gutted and died. Laying there in silence listening to the hymns of the brothers in the distance she looked at his face. Studied the lines of it, how youthful he seemed now, the way his hair, finally clean, glowed as brightly as the songs always said it did. She wanted to say, I love you like a thunder storm, like a lion, like a helpless rage; but instead she said: “I think I’m going to marry Hyle.”


End file.
